The Desert Fiddler

  CHAPTER IV

  It was a little after sundown when Bob rode up to the Chandler ranch.The girl was out under the cottonwood trees by the irrigation canalgathering up dry sticks for stove wood. He hitched his horse and wentto her.

  "Good evening," he said.

  "Where is your fiddle?" There was a faint twist of amusement at thecorner of her mouth.

  "How did you know?"

  "Guessed it," she replied, with a little lift of the eyebrows; and thenstooped to pick up the armful of dry sticks she had gathered.

  "Let me have them." He stepped forward to take the wood.

  "Why should you?" she said, without offering to relinquish them. "Iprefer to carry my own sticks--then I don't have to build fires forother people." He laughed, and followed her up the path toward theshack.

  "Let us sit down here." She led the way to a homemade bench in theopen. "Daddy has had a hard day and has gone to bed, and I don't wantto disturb him. He's very tired and has been upset over this leasebusiness."

  That was an opening, but before he could take advantage of it sheabruptly changed the conversation:

  "But you haven't told me why you didn't bring your fiddle this time.I'd love to hear it on a night like this." Dusk was coming swiftly andthe stars had begun to glimmer.

  "Oh, I don't carry it round as a business," he answered. "Fact is,until the other night I had not played it but twice in eight years."

  "Why?" She turned to him with curious interest.

  "It hasn't usually brought me good luck."

  "What happened the other two times?"

  Jenkins and Lolita awed by Percy's fiddling.]

  He looked off at the very bright star in the west and smiled withwhimsical ruefulness. "I love music--that is, what I call music. WhenI was in the Ozarks I fiddled a lot, but discovered it did not bring mewhat I wanted, so I went to work. I got a job in a bank at Oakville;was to begin work Monday. I was powerful proud of that job, and hadgot a new suit of clothes and went to town Saturday. That night therewas a dance, and they asked me to play for it." He stopped to chuckle,but still a little regretfully. "My playing certainly made a hit.Sunday morning a preacher lambasted the dance, and called me thespecial messenger of the devil. My job was with a pillar of hischurch. I didn't go to work Monday morning. It's a queer world; thatpreacher was the father of Noah Ezekiel Foster, who is now working forBenson."

  She was looking out at the west, smiling; the desert wind pushed thehair back from her forehead. "And the other time you played?"

  "That was up at Blindon, Colorado." He showed some reluctance to goahead.

  "Yes?"

  "An old doctor and his daughter came to the camp to invest. Ioverheard them in the next room at the boarding house, and knew a gangof sharks was selling them a fake mine. I tried to attract theirattention through the partition by playing a fool popular song--'If youtell him yes; you are sure to cry, by and by.'"

  "Did you make them understand?" She had locked her hands round herknees and leaned interestedly toward him.

  "Yes--and also the gang. The camp made up money to pay the undertakerto bury me next day. I still have the receipt."

  "You have had a lot of experience," she said with a touch of envy.

  "More than the wisdom I have gathered justifies, I fear," he replied.

  "Experiences are interesting," she observed. "I haven't had many, butI'm beginning. Daddy was professor of Sanskrit in a little one-horsedenominational college back in the hog-feeding belt of the Middle West.Heavens!" she spoke with sudden fierceness, "can you imagine anythingmore useless than teaching Sanskrit? His salary was two hundreddollars a year less than the janitor's. I hated being poor; and Ihated worse the dry rot of that little faculty circle. The deadlyseriousness of their piffling, pedantic talk about fine-spun scholasticpoints that were not interesting nor useful a thousand years ago, andmuch less now that they are absolutely dead. I hated being prim andpretentious. I could not stand it any longer, and made Daddy resignand go somewhere to plant something. We came out here and I thought Isaw a fortune in cotton.

  "Daddy's worked like a galley slave getting this field in; he's donethe work of two men. With one Chinaman's help part of the time he'sgot in a hundred and sixty acres of cotton. We've put through two hotsummers here; and spent every dollar we got for our household goods andhis life insurance. And now"--she was frowning in the dark--"we arewarned to get out."

  "Who warned you?" Bob asked quickly.

  "A Mexican named Madrigal. He has been right friendly to us; andwarned us last week that the Mexican Government is going to raise theduty on cotton so high this fall that it will take all the profit. Headvises us to sell our lease for anything we can get."

  "Have you had an offer?"

  "Yes," she shrugged in the dusk and spoke with bitter weariness, "asort of an offer. Mr. Jenkins offered us $500. Daddy wanted to takeit, but I objected. I guess, though, it is better than nothing."

  Bob stood up, his muscles fairly knotted. He understood in a flash whythe Mexican Jew was going to Jenkins' office. They were stampeding thesmall ranchers out of the country, and virtually stealing their leases.The stars ran together in an angry blur. He felt a swelling of thethroat. It was lucky he was miles away from Reedy Jenkins.

  "Don't take it!" he said with vehemence.

  Reedy Jenkins had just opened his office next morning and sat down atthe desk to read his mail when Bob Rogeen walked in. Reedy looked upfrom a letter and asked greedily:

  "Did you get it?"

  "No." There was something ominous in Rogeen's tone.

  "Couldn't you persuade them to sell?" Jenkins was openly vexed.

  "I persuaded them not to." Bob's hands opened and shut as though theywould like to get hold of something. "I don't care for this job. I'mdone."

  "What's the idea?" There was a little sneer in Jenkins' tone."Decided you would go back to the old job selling pots and pans?"

  "No," and Bob's brown eyes, almost black now, looked straight intoReedy's flushed, insolent face, "I'm going across the line to _raisecotton_."

  Reedy's wide mouth opened in a contemptuous sneer.

  "It's rather hot over there for rabbits."

  "Yes," Bob's lips closed warningly, "and it may become oppressive forwolves."

  Their eyes met defiantly for a moment, and each knew the otherunderstood--and it meant a fight.